Among a another book that I picked up today (Lies The Government Told You)I also picked up:
The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets: How to Keep Your Portfolio Up When the Market is Down (Peter Schiff)
So, I was just wondering what other investing books I should pick up as well. If anyone remembers my not too recent post on the forums awhile back, I generally don’t concentrate in one area when I’m reading anything related to AE so I do like to skip around a bit.
Has anyone read the book by Schiff I mentioned above? Is it any good?
(On another note, I’m also reading MES, but I soon realized that you have to read it in short bursts to mantain your sanity, it can be very heavy at times)
Haven’t read that particular book by Schiff, but it’ll probably something along the lines of investing in gold and commodities and how the West is living off of credit and it’ll lead to poverty. That’s just my guess. Should be an easy read, in general.
If you can, it is a good idea to have a personal financial advisor. Particulary if you have one that has been doing business with family or friends for years.
Read ‘The Intelligent Investor’ by Benjamin Graham, it comes highly recommended by Warren Buffet (something about ‘best book about investing ever’). Think very carefully about investing, before you start. And don’t assume you’ll make a mountain of money with some magical system.
The most convincing advice I’ve heard on “investing” is by this man, Robert Kiyosaki. He has a bunch of lectures you can watch on google video, although he writes books on the subject too:
Save 1/3rd of what you earn, always, even if this involves real hardship
Use your savings to buy things which will pay you money even if you just sit there (i.e., invest in property and be a landlord, buy a portion of a business)
Go into debt to do more of #2.
I think on the one hand; he’s right, this is probably the most effective strategy for becoming rich these days, and on the other, that’s why we’re all doomed, if the most sure road to wealth in our economy isn’t creating wealth, but being able to use leverage to extract rent from others .
Rich dad Poor dad has to be one of the worst investing books ever made (if you can even call it a investing book). Read the critique below to know what I’m talking about.
Anyone know how “Applied Value Investing: The Practical Application of Benjamin Graham and Warren Buffett’s Valuation Principles to Acquisitions, Catastrophe Pricing and Business Execution” is?
There is definitely no one book or even few books that will tackle investing anywhere near its entirety but I will make a couple recommendations. First, since you are a member of this web site I’m sure you have a good grasp of economics which is a great start. It’s always good to understand finance decently well so I would suggest getting a book on that before anything else if you are not already familiar with the subject. Check out Jim Rogers’s books; especially Hot Commodities*: How Anybody Can Invest Profitably in the World’s Best Market*. Although the title suggests the book only focuses on commodity investing it has so many valuable lessons for investing in general I would recommend it to any beginner. Not to mention Rogers is so easy to understand and is one of the most straight forward writers I’ve read.
One of the best things you can read for investing is a newspaper. Investing requires a complete working knowledge of what’s going on in the world and how one event can lead to another, how and why certain trends may form and what will benefit, what is an indication to get out of a certain investment and maybe into another, going long undervalued assets and short overvalued ones based on this information, etc. It requires a ton of research (to be good at it) and also nerves of steel. Best of luck.
Edit #2: Short version of my rant: financial advisors suck - they lose big when the market does. Very few can individuals can trade profitably with regularity. Read on for the book I recommend:
Finanacial Advisors don’t know sh**. A good money manager will make money in every market - good or bad and can make 100-500% a year till their accounts become too big to move about quickly (illiquid). Then they make only 20-100% each year. The accounts they manage become too big and illiquid also because everyone finds out about them and gives them their money to manage. They also have high minimums like $1 mil and you have to keep it there 1-3 years minimum, so most people can’t do that.
If you could only read one book, I’d read ‘Trading for a Living’ by Elder. It’s good for all markets - stocks, futures, forex, etc. Graham and Buffet’s strategies are good as long as the market goes up long term (i.e. 10-30 years), which, who knows what will happen in 10 years?
Trading is not for everyone, most people fail. Even those that make money lose on most trades. Protecting your capital is rule #1. I like Marc Faber’s advice: 1) invest in what you know & 2)Invest in yourself. If you know how to make money selling cars or real estate stick to that.
I see nothing wrong with investing in your self in the form of education or skills or a trade as long as it’s relevant and will pay off what you put in - like a masters or Ph.d in Accounting, Engineering or Physics, a law degree to become a patent attorney, tax attorney or something that should be pretty easy to make a good to great income in the years ahead.
Good Luck
Edit: I’d put my money in a savings account before giving it to a financial advisor. They tend to go whichever way the market’s going, which is fine if you know when to exit the market.
Edit #2: Another note about financial advisors they can lose 50% during bad years like '08-09 but will recover with the market, but maybe not everything - why I say it’s good to know when to use them and when not to and exit.
